Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!epiwrl!epimass!jbuck
From: jbuck@epimass.EPI.COM (Joe Buck)
Newsgroups: comp.mail.misc
Subject: Re: !-path rerouting: One reason for doing so
Message-ID: <2014@epimass.EPI.COM>
Date: 19 Mar 88 03:13:59 GMT
References: <8563@tut.cis.ohio-state.edu>
Reply-To: jbuck@epimass.EPI.COM (Joe Buck)
Organization: Entropic Processing, Inc., Cupertino, CA
Lines: 25

In article <8563@tut.cis.ohio-state.edu> karl@triceratops.cis.ohio-state.edu (Karl Kleinpaste) writes:
>Although one would generally like to have !-paths left intact, there
>is at least one circumstance wherein reroutes are entirely
>appropriate.  When a site is set up to do replies using the Path:
>header line due to not having INTERNET #defined, then reroutes may be
>a necessary fact of life.

There is no longer a good reason not to define INTERNET, even for
sites with primitive mailers, when news 2.11 is used.

>The reason is that not all host1!host2 connections that show up in the
>Path: line are UUCP connections.

I have no problem with rerouting when the path is invalid, and the
rerouting is done to the first host, not the last.  a!b!c!user says
to send to a, then to b, then to c, then to user.  If a doesn't talk
directly to b, then a can route to b.  a should not attempt to route
directly to c in this case, though, since UUCP names can be ambiguous.
Now that we have the host.domain!user syntax, ! no longer implies
a direct UUCP connection.  But it is a route just the same.


-- 
- Joe Buck  {uunet,ucbvax,sun,<smart-site>}!epimass.epi.com!jbuck
	    Old Internet mailers: jbuck%epimass.epi.com@uunet.uu.net